The Dallas daily herald. [volume] (Dallas, Tex.) 1873-1887, 1887-03-23
A WONDERFUL DISCOVERY.
6dison's Latest Invention Puts All
Previous Ones I'm tho shnde--A
Story that Reads Well Even II
It Isn't True.

IL Isn't True.
A writer in The Washington Post
gives an account of recent interview
Edison, the inventor. In this inter-
view Edison Is made to des cribe new
machine which he calls the nutrlcator'
This machine, the writer says, has ac-
complished the problem of combining
the natural elements so as to manufac-
ture wholesome food Ellison is made
TO say in ,his interview: I'm ten years
my machines will be used to provide
the tables of the civilized world. Meat
will be no longer killed and vegetables
no longer grown, except by savagcs,
for my meathods will be SO much
cheaper" Mr. Edison then exhibited
samples Of food which he said he had
made from dirt in his cellar and from
water taken from the water-pipes in
the house. The writer says:
He led me down pair of stairs into
light basement room, where n
swarthylooking man was busy about
big machine, an iron vessel, holding
about barrel, attached to something
that looked like a hydraulic ram. The
shelves were lined with chemicals.
There was q small battery in the cor
ner from which one wire went to the
vat. A kerosene lamp burned under a
sort of re tort That and four crooked
pipes with handles were all that was
visible
"How is IL nowp" said Ed son. about
53," replied the man. That was all.
We returned to the room above. 81
shall simplify that machine one-half,
he remarked yet with that can
turn out at least five tons OF food of va
rious kinds every day. | have already
made eighteen kinds of food. | will
tell you something if you will not say a
word till | say go ahead All food
comes, of course, primarily. from the
earth. The plants and fruits we eat
come from the moist ground, and the
animals we eat live Oh plants. or on
other animals which the plants have
kept alive. So all fool comes from the
elements stored in earth, air and water.
You eat grain of wheat for instance.
The wheat is simply composed of few
simple gasses and salts that last year
were lying dormant in the earth, air,
and water.
1T appeared to me that the process
\ might be fastened; that instead of wait
ing year for nature to collect those ell
ements into an organic seed could coll
lect them in an hour, or perhaps few
minutes. and arrive ut the same result
by combining them organically. This
] have DONE | first find out what
particular kind of food is made of.
There are sixty-iive simple elements in
nature; that is, substances which we
call elements, because we have not yet
succeeded in proving them to be COM
pound. | am afraid your readers will
not generally understand what | am
going to say. If you use it be careful
to take it down verbatim.
There are sixty-fv elements Car
bon is the king of these. 1t is the great
organizer. 1t is never absent from any |
plant or animal organism. 1t is at the
base of almost everything. 1t is the
key to my discovery, for it possesses
the peculiar capacity to form MOLE
cules from its own atoms. The dia-
mond is pure carbon, so are graphite |
and charcoal nearly pure carbon,
though they are so different. Sugar
and starch belong to the hydrocarbons.
and l cannot understand why their
manufacture out of earth and water
hasn't been hit on before. l form all
my meat compounds by expressing
three elements in red-hot state to nj
trogen gas. though 1use different fla
vors, which / get from the earth, too.
/ have had to bring from Yves leicester
county some argillaceo us sell not found
here.
IL can make n wine, aud have made
IL. with New Jersey earth and water
that no man can tell from Chateau
Yquem. | find that those elements
combine at the lowest temperature that
have the same atomicity-that is, the
same bonds by which they unite with
one another or with compound mole
cules. This great invention has not
been hit on before because analytic
ohanistrv has received too much At